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Wasn’t Monday a Holiday for Everyone?

I am here to apologize for missing my Monday post on John Calvin. I am going to let this one go by until next Monday, and pretend that Monday June 7 was just one of those Monday holidays. A Monday Blogging Holiday.

The past six days were a bit of a crazy blur around here. My sweet mother was visiting for a month, and as she grows more and more frail physically, I believe that travel and life with six kids, two dogs and a raccoon becomes more than she might need. So, the short story on this is that we spent Sunday in the hospital and the days around Sunday getting her strong and ready to travel home.

As always, she flew out of Buffalo, and we overnighted there on Monday, since she had an early AM flight for Tuesday.
While driving along Transit Road, where the shopping is so magnificent, Mom saw that there was a Steinmart (an old favorite store of hers for clothing ) and she perked right up, the old glow returned to her green eyes, and said “Oh, can we go?”

Having spent a week thinking of her as a delicate patient, I was pretty delighted at this sign of life and enthusiasm. I slammed on breaks, U-turned and we were in the store. She made a quick and profitable stop at Jones New York, and then made herself at home at Steinmart. Even when she’s ill, Mom’s always got an eye open for the perfect coordinate at the right price. Oh, and she needed summer handbags, too.

Now, while she was in Steinmart having a lovely time, I took the opportunity to go to the parking lot and try to figure out why Maggie’s carseat was giving us trouble. She had complained of it being too tight, and the belts were refusing to loosen up to give her a roomier fit. So I pulled it out of the car in the parking lot and when I flipped it over, I found that something had eaten one of those most critical pieces of webbing…the central strap at the end of which all the buckles converge to keep her safely locked in. And there was a little pile of wadded up, chewed up webbing clogging the device so that I couldn’t lengthen the strap.

I wasn’t at that moment able to work through what it might mean that something is chewing on her carseat. Like, are there mice in the van? It’s more likely that we left the seat in the garage for a time, and mice found something yummy on the webbing there.
Anyhoo…….Being so thankful to have found the problem, I hollered at Mom in Steinmart that Maggie and I were going to pop over to Target to get a new carseat.
Leaving Mom blissfully wandering among the racks, we zipped through Target where I threw the pinkest booster seat ever made into the cart along with pair of Tinkerbell flip-flops (also for Maggie), and some swim trunks for David. Then back to get Mom, who was still not ready to leave the store.

Finally, Steinmart closed and we were able to take my mother with us and check in to our hotel.

So, how funny it was on Tuesday morning at 6am, time to grab a quick breakfast and dash across the street to the airport. I found Mom wrestling with what at first looked like a live alligator, then I realized it was her suitcase. She had gotten so many adorable little items at Steinmart and Jones, that it took both of us with 35 lb Maggie sitting on the bag to get it closed and…finally… zipped. You could not insert a piece of paper into that bag at that point.
Beaming victoriously and high fiving all around, I then noticed the pink plastic mini-dishpan which contains all of her medication. Woops! The handbags and clothes were in the bag, but there was no room for those pesky little pills which may be keeping her alive.
But God is good and provides a way, often even when we are a little bit silly. It just happens that while in Target, had grabbed, on the fly as I raced toward the register, a medium sized green print bag to take home to Helen. So I threw Mom’s prescriptions into that, and off we dashed to the airport. Mom did comment, softly and sort of under her breath, that the green didn’t go well with the brown and black she was wearing, but neither would the new summer handbags in her suitcase.

Isn’t she fun!! I do love it about my mom that even in the face of illness and the limitations with which her stroke has left her, she still takes care to present herself beautifully and she still grabs a bit of life in whatever way she can.

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3 thoughts on “Wasn’t Monday a Holiday for Everyone?”

Your Dearie reminds me of my mom, Missy! At almost 85, she still worries about being seen without lipstick, and frets about whether this top really goes with those “slacks,” or that necklace complements her outfit well enough 😉 When hearing about an event, she always wants to know what people were wearing — and I can rarely provide her with those details!

Missy, I love reading your stories. Please give all of your kids, Jon and Dearie hugs from us. It’s so nice to get a peek into your life here.
I feel like my head is full of post-it notes with unfinished to-do items.
Maybe you can think of a better metaphor? I find reading MissyBlog is relaxing. Love to you all